Ninth and Last
by StickGirl
Summary: Some introspection from Commander John Koenig. Is he alone?


**Ninth and Last**

wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww

He heard her.

_"John!"_

She was crying for him, wanting him near, begging him to stay alive and come to her aid.

_"John!" _

He reached out, almost believing he could touch her or, at least, make contact with some part of himself that had not yet given up. He could almost hear somebody say: 'He has conquered his fear.' And it affronted him.

Had he? Had he accepted the inevitable? Was he ready to die? Unafraid?

_No._

Floating in outer-space he might have been but he was too proud and – yes dammit – arrogant to merely drift about, rehashing old regrets and longings, and accepting death.

_His_ death … and _hers_.

"Helena." he whispered, recalling how she was imprisoned in the cubical. Yet, he saw her reaching out to him, wanting him, wishing he could share the bliss she had found, the peace and beauty of living a life without fear … Hitherto, also wanting his touch, reaching for him as he now reached for her … "Helena, help me. Bring me to the planet … _I want to be with you_."

If he could not rescue her, if the mysterious planet was not Alpha's to share, then he at least did not want to be alone, in the darkness, living out his last hours as the recluse he had become on Earth. He had been a boy once with few friends, then a man who could only look up at the moon and stare at it from his apartment balcony … He wanted to live on the moon; on Alpha as he had in the past … a man …

… who had found the love of his life: _The moon._

Or, no. Not just the moon anymore.

"_Helena_." He whispered again, suddenly feeling his body moving, nearly hurdling, propelled to the planet.

She was doing it – calling to him …. _"John!"_

"Hold on, Helena! I'll be there soon. Wait for me!"

And suddenly he was there, his stun gun in hand, and he was angry – and afraid. He needed to find Helena but they would stop him. They would stop …

John Koenig remembered his friends. Victor, Paul, Alan and all the others … They were still approaching the planet, hoping to colonize. Alpha was dead. His much beloved moon was no longer habitable. Koenig knew he could not reason with these alien people. He had tried and they would not listen.

What was he to do?

He saw the back of the alien and lifted his gun … This was wrong. Somehow he knew it would end badly but he had to take the chance. He was their Commander and his people needed a home.

He watched the madness his choice had wrought; explosions, fire, gases, death and destruction.

"Helena!" he cried, searching through the chaos and praying. Then, when he saw her, lying in the rubble, her face away from him … he felt his throat constrict. He did this. He had meant to save her but he had killed her.

He walked to her slowly, her face hidden from him. Was it disfigured? Had he ruined her physical beauty as well as destroying the woman's inner beauty? He was not a shallow man but he had to know. Slowly, he turned her over and felt strangely relieved. No scaring. An oddly lovely, peaceful face in the midst of the devastation he had wrought. He pulled her to him, looking closer, suddenly realizing she was not dead but merely unconscious.

Her eyes opened and he felt suddenly awash in love. He held her as she wept.

How long they sat there he did not know but, eventually, the noise stopped and he looked at Helena. Her face was tear-streaked but accepting.

They would spend the rest of their lives together, on this destroyed planet.

He should have felt horrible but he did not. He felt the material of her silky alien robe. How strangely familiar it felt._ Too_ familiar …

And suddenly he was not breathing in smoke and pungent fumes but the fragrance of flowers, feeling the warmth of soft hair against his cheek.

His eyes opened slowly and in the dim light, automatically softened for the early morning hours, he was brought back to the present. That time had been many months ago; a nightmare that had never actually taken place.

This was before Arkadia, Maya, and even before Scotland in 1339.

The material he had felt, what he thought was Helena in the gown of those mysterious aliens who attempted to teach the Alphans a lesson, was actually Helena's pajama top. He had rubbed his fingers up and down her arms in his sleep.

He smiled.

Last night had been her first night out of Medical Center after three days of illness. An infection she had caught while on Earth, in Scotland, had been eradicated. John brought Helena to her quarters to finish up her convalescents and she asked him to stay, to be with her, to hold her while she slept. He had donned his own pajamas and joined her on the bed and both were asleep within minutes.

Presently, she moved in his arms, shrugging a bit, but pillowing her head on his shoulder.

Why had he dreamed about a time in their past, filled with horror and fear, when he was now at peace, with the love of his life so close?

'Because you nearly lost her.' His subconscious muttered, 'Both times.'

He wondered briefly if it was better not to love, not to feel the wretchedness that came from near loss, not to feel the fear that only a love relationship could conjure in a man with too vivid an imagination. No, it was not better. He remembered that boy in his past, that lonesome fool of a man who had only wanted to live on the moon one day, and he sighed.

Fingers reached to touch her warm face, to caress the high bones of her aristocratic cheeks, and he watched as her eyes fluttered open and she looked up at him.

"Good morning." Helena whispered, throatily.

"Thank you for being here." he murmured.

She looked at him, curiously.

Gently, he reached down and touched her lips with his own.

He was gratified when he felt a hand, gentle fingers, touch the back of his neck.

John Koenig, he thought, ninth and possibly last Commander of Moonbase Alpha had the moon … and so much more.

He was not alone.

wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww

THE END

May 1-3, 2013


End file.
